Alright, B was the obvious, favorite choice. Hopefully, the votes move fast enough for two or more updates, today.

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Eventually, our creatures simply...move away from the threat, even though they move away from the primary food source of algae, however, down on the bottom, in the murky silt that had begun to build up over the millions of years, where waste and the carcasses of other creatures fell to be devoured, as well as "lesser" organisms that fed on the same things. Eyes grew fairly useless in the muck, and weakened a bit, but for the quality of eyesight that was lost, much was gained in the form of gaining two forward, weak, jointed arms with a pair of tiny little claws on each that were used to gently probe through the muck and grab bits of food that it could find.

The jets that used to be primary movement grew to be obsolete, and only one remained in front to function as a rudimentary mouth, while the rear ones were kept to function as a self-defense mechanism to stir up silt and debris to blind any Plakth that came bravely down to the dark, murky bottom. Population was kept at a fairly stable level, and grew slightly isolated from the rest of the biome.

One group fragments from the mainstream population by venturing far too close to a large aquifer, moving to a wide, if dramatically shallower pool. Thick green foliage is planted along the edges and even in the murky silt that was much more pronounced here than any other place, and was unsuitable to Plakth, as they couldn't see in the muck, and unsuitable for algae as just the bare top was uncovered with stirred silt from the rough current that was draining to other pools that held more of the thick flora. Here, our creatures flourish by devouring rotten plant material, and smaller organisms, growing much dramatically larger in size, now nearly four millimeters in general size, and nearly symbiotic with the plants, as the removal of old plant mass granted more space for new plants to grow.

Other organisms, albeit smaller ones, live on the dry surface, notably, a species of social arachnids that create a series of webs to form colonies among the small leaves of the primitive foliage, though they posed no threat since they were incapable of swimming or breathing in water. Other larger and smaller species of other indepentent arthropods lived on the rocky surface, where the soil was thin and fairly sandy.

A - Develop a form of amphibious lungs, and take advantage of decaying matter and small(er) animals on the shoreline.

B - Further develop the mouth, so as to begin to eat harder substances, and munch on some of the plants that grow here.

C - Begin using large towheads of plants as instinctive, communal nesting grounds.

D - Find some way to get at some of the other organisms that live in the plant "canopy."

A- the other options just drag the creature away from the scummy scavenger niche.

You're totally fixated on that, aren't you?

Yes, itll be a nice counterpoint to all the 'we are the superior beings' type aliens (like the cryoeltans ). A race of scummy, ugly aliens who are well aware of their standing in the order of things but have managed to somehow trancend their lowly status and become a spacefaring civilisation (eventually)

Ugh. Update would have been up at around 10 if I had gotten that damn sixth vote early enough. Aaanyways, here it is.

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Primitive amphibious lungs are developed, which are...surprisingly inefficient. Regardless, it gives our creature enough breath to slowly drag itself onto shore and eat carcasses that tend to drift to shore with the water. Other creatures are far too smart and...not stupid to get close enough to be gobbled up, though fellow arthopods had long since developed carapaces too hard to be incapacitated, especially since, well, our creature was fairly in the lower-mid sized range, as the other land-based organisms seemed to have been around for a much longer span of time, as evidenced by how adapted they seemed to be with the marsh biome.

Eyes regained their former strength and stronger out of neccesity to find food on the shoreline easier, and as well as to avoid predators. The previously mentioned, social arachnids began predating on our creatures by waiting until they got onto shore, and then ensaring them in webs and taking them off to be devoured. They didn't become a primary source of food for the arachnids, but more of a convenient snack when the opportunity arose. The overall size of our creatures continued to swell, for a number of reasons, namely, it made swooping the unsuspecting creatures into the canopy a relatively difficult thing to do, as well a result of an expanded food palette.

A - Develop some better locomotion so that when on land, our creature isn't just dragging themselves limply across the shore.

B - Get a pair of mandibles to bite back at the little buggers that are taking advantage of us.

Yeah, I didn't think that anything but more legs would come out of this. Aaanyways, moving on.

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The rear of our creature further develops, forming a kind of segmented tail that inched and writhed with nubby little feet while the front remained to have a pair of jointed legs. In the water, movement improved even more dramatically, with one massive rudder-like tail now forming along a bit more of a streamlined body. Camouflage was excellent as what had once been a protective membrane is now a hard carapace, though these creatures, growing to be about half the size of one's pinky finger, never had a molting process. Rather, the carapace simply split and rehardened over the body to form a textured, rough shell resembling something close to tree bark or coarse sand.

With a more streamlined body and a bit more force in the rear, our creatures are capable of burrowing into the sand, often digging gently, just beneath the surface, to keep any opposing arachnids from stealing them away, though that proved to take more than just one or two, now. With burrowing also came sustenance in the form of gently sucking on the bottom of roots. A little scraping with the frontal claw, and our critters could easily suck and get some form of sap, though the under-developed mouth prohibited too much suction, and thus, prevented it from becoming a major food source, for now.

A - Get out of the freaking water and adapt further. No reason to stick around too long.

B - Better mouthparts for a wider omnivorous, as well as detritivous diet.